A blog devoted to advancing the study of conscientious objection through the martial art of aikido.

Tuesday, March 4, 2014

A Tale of Two Larks

In the early 1980s, after the state put a bounty on child abusers, it became de riguer in divorce cases to claim one spouse was abusing a child. The charge was so odious in the beginning it was believed. Young lawyers desiring to build careers would push this. I observed two cases, in which neither was there abuse, but the results varied.

In the one a charge was offered but it went no where, and that was pretty much the end of it, except for a wariness of the one spouse over for what the other was capable.

In the other, the charge was investigated, the weight of the court came down on the spouse, a father, and the wife kept doubling down. In spite of no evidence of wrongdoing, the father was forbidden to see his daughters, and this injustice invited even more doubling down, until a poison killed family relationships and even father-daughter connections. A no contact order was put in place, and as far as I know, the father has not seen the daughters for over thirty years.

The father went on to a life not unlike many others who experience an unspeakable injustice, a life with pain, but grace behind it. The mother went on to a different unhappiness. Pain with no grace, a very ugly place to be.

We hate those we harm. If and when we get a little power, even by proxy, and we begin to do wrong with it, it is near impossible not to double down. A lie about abuse which would have been about two people led to unspeakable pain among four people, and no doubt countless others who loved all involved.